Cousins, 12, and five, crushed by fuel tanker

A horrific accident on the One Mile Public Road, Wismar, shortly after noon yesterday, has left two children dead, and an entire family and community in a state of shock.
Dead are five-year-old Akeela Samuels of One Mile Nursery School, and her 12-year-old cousin Shaka Anthony, a first form student of Mackenzie High School.
The two were on their way home on a bicycle, at around 12:15 hrs, when a Bosai Minerals fuel truck ran over them, killing little Akeela on the spot. Her cousin reportedly received head injuries and his left arm was severely mangled. He died a little over two hours later at the Mackenzie Hospital. A motor car was also reportedly involved in the accident.
A huge crowd converged on the gruesome scene of the accident, where the tanker had come to a standstill more than thirty yards away from the point of impact. Eyewitnesses claim that the driver, who quickly exited the vehicle and ran away, had been speeding.
They claim that the car, PKK 8621, which was travelling in the opposite direction, had slowed down to allow the children to cross near a pedestrian crossing, but the tanker, GFF 9050, could not stop because of the fast rate it was going and struck the children.
Irate residents had threatened to beat the driver.
However, according to a police statement, “Investigations revealed that motor lorry GFF 9050 and motor car PKK 8621 were proceeding in opposite directions along the roadway when it is alleged that Shaka Anthony, who was towing Akila Samuels on a bicycle, rode out from an access road and collided with the motor car.
As a result of the collision, the two children fell off the bicycle into the path of the motor lorry and were run over.
The two motorists are in police custody assisting with the investigations.”
Akeela Samuels’ head was crushed by one of the rear wheels of the truck.
The two children were subsequently taken to the Linden Hospital Complex, where Samuels was confirmed dead, and her cousin was taken into theatre for emergency surgery, for his badly mangled arm, which was slated for amputation, according to informed sources. The boy reportedly died around 15:00hrs.
Meanwhile at the children’s home, family members gathered around and were speaking calmly, though tearfully, of the accident.
Skaka Anthony’s distraught mother spoke quietly to the media.
The woman said that her sister, Keisha Anderson, Akeela’s mother, had gone to Georgetown to take a relative to the hospital. The children’s fathers are in the interior.
Akeela Samuels was to participate in an African Day activity at her school today, according to her aunt. ‘Her clothes already pressed and everything’; she was always up and around, so fidgety, she was a happy child’ the woman sighed tearfully.
Her mother, Keisha Anderson, was on her way to Linden when she received the tragic news. It was on her return home that pandemonium broke out, as the news of the death of Shaka Anthony had just been relayed to the family via telephone.
Family members screamed hysterically and many were inconsolable. Anthony’s mother, who knew that her son was in the hospital but was not yet aware that he had died, had to be forcefully restrained, after she hysterically demanded to be taken to the hospital.
As Afi Hinckson turned up at the house, the woman rushed out of the taxi crying “Oh God! Dey kill me only child. Dey kill me only child pon de pedestrian crossing!”
Meanwhile residents of the community have said that they are very disturbed that trucks which are not supposed to use the One Mile main road still continue do so, even though they have been mandated to use an alternative route.